Granted, DNC Chair, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Shultz is not the sharpest pencil in the box, but today she reached a new low. She wrote an op-ed in US News and World Report claiming that Republicans are trying to restrict voting, especially minority voting with laws aimed at reducing voter fraud and requiring people to show ID when they show up to vote.

Across the country, Republicans are working to restrict Americans’ right to vote by enacting laws that curb when and how they can register to vote and go to the polls. For example, Republicans in Maine’s legislature have voted to end Election Day registration, a widely popular practice that, in 2008 alone, allowed 60,000 Mainers to register to vote.

The problem with the election day registration is it makes fraud easy because town clears became overwhelmed with trying to verify the voter information.

The bill was strongly supported by town clerks, who said they have been overwhelmed by increasing numbers of voters who cast absentee ballots and who wait until Election Day to register. The measure also had the support of Secretary of State Charles Summers, whose office oversees elections in Maine.

House Speaker Robert Nutting, R-Oakland, applauded the bill’s passage Monday.

“This bill will alleviate a significant amount of the growing stress on our election system by making minor changes to registration and absentee ballot deadlines,” Nutting said. “These changes will go a long way toward maintaining the integrity of our voting system, while providing an open and accessible voting process for all Mainers.”

Shultz goes on to criticize attempts to clean up the voter registration system, where groups such as ACORN were convicted of using voter drives as a way to load the system with fake (Democratic Voters).

And in my home state of Florida, early voting days were eliminated as part of a 158-page bill that also enacted onerous restrictions and steep fines on organizations that conduct voter registration drives.

These kinds of laws have a detrimental impact on all Americans, but they particularly affect minorities. The nonpartisan, nonprofit Project Vote has found that African-Americans and Latinos are more likely than white voters to register through a voter registration drive. That means that in Florida, where the League of Women Voters has halted its voter registration activities as a result of the new Republican law, fewer minority Americans will have the chance to register and vote.

Despite a complete lack of evidence of widespread voter fraud, Republicans have made it a priority to enact costly photo ID legislation that would restrict the voting rights of eligible Americans. In states like Wisconsin, Texas, and Kansas, Republican governors and legislators campaigned on small government and fiscal austerity, but now they are allocating millions of dollars for new photo ID requirements.

Acorn has been charged or convicted of voter registration fraud in (by my count) 16 different states in recent years. Wassermann-Schultz is ignoring that fact (here is a partial list). In the DNC Chair’s own state, ACORN tried to register Mickey Mouse.

According to the Congresswoman guaranteeing an honest vote should not be a priority of government.

In Wisconsin, implementing photo ID requirements will cost the state at least $7 million, and the Institute for Southern Studies has estimated that North Carolina’s photo ID bill would cost between $18 million and $25 million. As states continue to face billion-dollar budget deficits, lay off teachers, and shrink police departments, spending millions of public dollars for partisan gain is the height of irresponsibility. Despite the high price tag, the GOP has advanced photo ID mandates in more than 30 states. These laws would increase the barriers to voting for the 11 percent of Americans—including disproportionate numbers of elderly Americans and minorities—who lack the required ID.

The concept of one man one vote is essential to the freedoms of the American republic. Allowing people to vote more than once, or allowing people to vote who shouldn’t partially disenfranchises those who are legally voting. The weight of the legal votes is watered-down by the inclusion of illegal votes. I would argue that protecting the concept of one man one vote should be a top priority of our government. But to Schultz and many progressives they call it racism in a desperate and illegal attempt to increase the number of Democratic voters.

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